Miami student part of NASA expedition to study climate change

11/06/2008

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Seventeen researchers from around the country, including Miami zoology grad student Kevin Rose, are in Chile and Bolivia this month to document the impact of rapid climate change on high-altitude lakes in the Central Andes, and their ability to sustain life in a highly dynamic environment.

Rose, also a Miami research assistant, became involved in the NASA Astrobiology Institute (NAI) - funded expedition because of his ongoing research of ultraviolet (UV) light and freshwater ecosystems. The group is studying high altitude lakes, which are considered "hot spots" of global warming and its effects, such as loss of precipitation (50 percent in 50 years in some parts), glacier retreat, and increased impact of UV radiation in bodies of water that evaporate. The researchers say the conditions are very similar to what Mars might have experienced about 3.5 billion years ago.

"I'm collecting information on the lakes and the watersheds that surround them, including the transparency of the water, the zooplankton that live in the lakes, and the materials in the water that control transparency," said Rose. "One of the main goals of the project is to use the lakes as analogs to what potentially existed on Mars millions of years ago. By examining the most extreme environments on Earth, such as extremely high UV, low oxygen, low temperatures, and low pH, we can infer what life, if it existed, may have had to deal with on Mars."

The project not only addresses the question about early Mars water, habitability, and life, it also documents a subject of critical importance on Earth right now: how water resources and life are responding to the climate change Earth is experiencing today.

The expedition has caught the attention of adventure filmmaker Gordon Brown, who is currently with the group documenting the progress of the expedition and the research driving it. Brown's work has been featured on National Geographic Explorer, Discovery, IMAX, ESPN, MTV and others.

"Very few places in the world have the extreme conditions found here," said Rose. "The Atacama desert is the driest place on Earth. The lakes are among the highest in elevation in the world. UV levels here are among the highest on Earth. The combination of these factors makes it an ideal site to study how life persists in an extreme environment and the conditions in which life can thrive."

Rose will return to Miami at the end of the month to analyze samples and data. His hope is to publish his findings in a peer-reviewed journal. According to Rose, understanding the response of these lakes and life adaptation to rapid changes may hold important clues to forecasting the evolution of other threatened terrestrial lakes, and possibly finding solutions to global warming.

Rose is the doctoral student of Craig Williamson, Ohio Eminent Scholar of Ecology at Miami.